DotHack UNITY
by Joko-sama
Summary: It's about two teens, Hikaru Yamato and Hikari Sakura. They start the latest craze, The World, and enter a whole new world of mystery and danger.
1. Chapter 1

DISCLAIMER: I do not own .hackor any of its characters.  
  
"Yamato!" A young schoolgirl, long, brown hair flowed with the wind, blowing against her body, stands out on the basketball court cries out to a boy, who stops in the middle of a game, dropping the ball. "Come! NOW!"  
  
"Sorry guys..." The black haired boy waved good-bye to the others, walking over to the girl; the other boys make whipping noises as he walked away.  
  
"What is it, Sakura?" Yamato asked the girl, feeling like a loser to give up playing a game to WALK with Sakura.  
  
"My friends told me about this game, The World!" She exclaimed in a high tone of voice. She pulled a guidebook out of her purse and handed it to Yamato.  
  
"The World? What an original name..." A sarcastic remark given by Yamato as he flipped through the pages, looking at all the screenshots, weapon designs and pictures of example characters in the game.  
  
"Oh come on! Try it with me tonight!" Sakura squealed slightly as she thought about the game.  
  
"Why couldn't our other conversations have gone like that?" He gave a sigh as Sakura punched him for that remark.  
  
Yamato and Sakura, both 15 years old, aren't always compatible, but they got along just fine. Sakura was always excited about something or another, thinking about the positive and puts on a happy face even in the toughest situations. Yamato, however, wasn't always excited about doing something, but he always tries hard and excels at most things he does, excluding anything revolving around school.  
  
They each had a separate group of friends that they usually hung around with during the school day but some days, they just liked to hang out with each other. Yamato mainly hung around with a group of just some guys in his class, they weren't the most interesting conversationalists but Yamato didn't like to make friends that often. Sakura usually strolled around with the less popular girls in their class, as she wasn't too popular herself, though, she was always confident in herself.  
  
"Are you on yet?" Growled a frustrated Sakura, tapping the phone as she sat by her computer.  
  
"I'm still installing the program..." Yamato complained, smacking his monitor once before falling off his chair, phone slipping out of his hand.  
  
"When you get on, I'll be at the Chaos Gate with someone." She slammed the phone and put the game gear on, starting up The World.  
  
"The Chao wha? Wait, with WHO?" Confused, Yamato just hung up the phone and turned back to his monitor, the program FINALLY installed. He pulled his chair up and looked through the rulebook.  
  
Sitting down on the chair, Yamato places on his game gear and turns on The World, a strange blue screen flashed before his eyes and before he knew it, a black screen appeared, the words "Welcome to The World" slowly emerged, letter by letter.  
  
Yamato PoV  
  
Taking a look at the next screen, I had to design a character. First of all, I decided on a name. What should I go with? This was a decision that shouldn't be taken lightly as it was going to be the name I was going to use for a long time so I thought about it. I entered a few names; some people already used them. This angered me, it took me a while before I came up with names I could actually live with using! After a while, I just put in my own name and figure that should be sufficient. Luckily enough, it was accepted. Next, I had to decide on gender and class. I decided to be male for obvious reasons. I then picked the only class that caught my interest, Blade Master. I figured this kind of fit my personality after, taking a look at the other options, though I was tempted in choosing Heavy Blade. There was colour of hair and I thought about it.  
  
Should my character look like me? Will Sakura's look like her? Maybe I should make him look like me. I hope this will help Sakura recognize me.  
  
I chose black hair and a tanned body, a lot of options but I decided to go with the basics. There were several different options for the designs that were going to be on the body such as the patterns of marks across my body. I chose red and orange lines to run throughout my body and for small triangles across my cheeks. Now on clothing, what types of clothes should my character be wearing? My character was a Blade Master so I'd have to use something looks like I'm a master of the blade. I chose a golden breast plate with a large red cross on the center, golden shoulder armour with a red rim, this armour only on his right side, a white long sleeved shirt under all this armour, a pair of golden gloves, white pants and a pair of golden leg armour, orange rims. Now that my character had been decided, I was moved onto the game itself.  
  
As I began the game, there was some text that appeared in front of me reading "Aqua Capitol – Mac Anu". Three golden rings with some text that I couldn't read as it passed by too quickly, hovered around me and disappeared quickly. Looking around, I saw that the place  
  
"Yamato!" Hearing that voice, I could only conclude that the voice belonged to my friend, Sakura. "What took you so damn long?"  
  
"I had to design my character!" I found that I was always explaining myself to Sakura about one thing or another. This happened just about every time she yelled at me so it was quite often. I then noticed Sakura's character and it was very...revealing. Blushing slightly, I shook it off and looked at her without looking at her anywhere else.  
  
"Fine, whatever!" She sighed and that's when I noticed him. There was a guy with Sakura, someone I hadn't seen before, but then again, I haven't seen anyone before.  
  
"Who's HE?" I questioned, pointing over to the guy next to Sakura.  
  
"HE'S a SHE." Sakura stated, laughing at my crude intelligence.  
  
"What? That's clearly a man!" I stated, pointing at the character and waved my arms up and down to show how weird I got when she said that a guy such as that was a woman.  
  
"She's Hanako from school."  
  
"WHAT!!!!!"  
  
"You know, characters don't necessarily represent the player themselves." Hanako stated, her character name being Elexis.  
  
"You are too close-minded, Yamato." Sakura glared at me for a second. I looked at her character name; it was her real one.  
  
"And not very original either..." Elexis coughed slightly hinting at my name.  
  
"It was all I could think of since my other names were taken." I, once again, explained myself, though this time, to someone I barely knew. "Well, even so, Sakura's not very original either!"  
  
For that, I get clonked on the head. "It was your first time, I thought this way you would be able to recognize me! Idiot..." She muttered under her breath as she walked back to Elexis.  
  
"So what do we do now?"  
  
"Did you like, NOT read the guidebook?"  
  
"I skimmed through it..."  
  
"All you have to do is interact with other players, buy equipment and get stronger."  
  
"That's it? Let me ask this then, why do I have to play it?" Complaining was something I had grown accustomed to. I found from time to time, complaining was something easy and natural for me to do.  
  
"You're gonna do it and your gonna like it!" Sakura clonked me on the head again and dragged me up to the big ring thing.  
  
"Okay, add Sakura and I to your party." Elexis told me, giving a cold glare as he pointed his staff at me.  
  
"How do I do that?"  
  
"Eh...you go to your option screen and go to where it says party and add us, we'll give you our Member Addresses now." Sakura and Elexis both exchanged their Member Addresses with me and I did as they stated, opened that option window, scrolling down the words and clicked PartyAddSakura and then again, PartyAddElexis.  
  
"Now what do we do?" The two sighed as they gave that look to each other, saying that I was a lost cause.  
  
"Type in the keywords 'Chronicling, Destroyer's, Treasure Gem' and we'll go with you so we can fight some monsters." Sakura stated, jabbing me slightly as she began to disappear, three rings hovering over her, the same happening to Elexis.  
  
"The hell?" I was confused but I figured, some strange new crap so I'll just go with the flow. I typed in the keywords and disappeared, the rings around me.  
  
Materializing in a grassland field, I saw that Elexis and Sakura were already there, waiting for me but they seemed to find something strange about the area. I didn't see anything wrong with it, but this was my first time in one of these things so I guess it's only natural for me to think that.  
  
"Something the matter?" I asked the two, though, they gave me no response. I continued to gaze across the fields and noticed parts of the sky were ripped out and numbers were written.  
  
"What is all of this?" Well, Sakura didn't know what this was either so at least I'm not the idiot this time.  
  
"I heard about this. The level has been corrupted. We should leave immediately." Elexis stated, turning around but stopped and her voice stopped. I looked at her expression and twisted around to see what she was staring at.  
  
It was a large monster thing, a common thing, but it in translucent green hexagons. This monster had large claws but a skinny body and it carried around a large red staff that was luminous at the top, where the orb was. I didn't know what it was, but even I could recognize when something was wrong...most of the time. I saw Sakura try to attack it but the attack didn't even do anything to the monster. The creature prepared to strike back but I was going to allow that so when it fire a beam out of it's staff, I leapt out and tackled Sakura, moving her and myself out of the beam, but Elexis...he was not so fortunate and was hit.  
  
"Data Drain!" Shouted the monster, Elexis being absorbed by the beam and she vanished before my eyes.  
  
"What the hell?" I remarked getting up from the ground, seeing the monster target Sakura and I now.  
  
The orb began to glow, Sakura and I were stuck, paralyzed, and the monster was prepared to delete us. I still wondered what happens when a player gets deleted, I guess I'll get to learn first hand. A powerful flash of light grew in the orb and I was engulfed in the luminous energy from the orb, as was Sakura.  
  
"DATA DRAIN!" 


	2. Chapter 2

DISCLAIMER: I don't own hack or any of the characters blah blah blah...  
  
"DATA DRAIN!"  
  
Now facing the barrel of death, I heard someone shouting out. Turning in the direction that the voice originated from, I noticed someone firing a beam from his/her large blade; the beams intersected and cancelled out the effects of both beams.  
  
"Who are you?" Sakura asked, her eyes focused on the character. The monster cried out angrily, stomping its feet and prepared another attack.  
  
A dust cloud blew by as the figure face was revealed, giving off a female face with long blonde hair, about to allow her identity to be exposed, and gripped onto the handle of her sword, the blade gigantic to say the least yet seemed too easily lifted by the girl.  
  
"I am...Hikari!" The monster not allowing her to pull her little stunt once again, leapt at her, it's enormous claws slowly wrapping around her body.  
  
"Hikari!" I shouted out as I ran over to help her but suddenly, a large light grew from within the claws of the monster and it blew away.  
  
"Hmph, that all ya got?" The girl smirked, holding out her staff and a large circle appeared where there was a golden orb at the end of the blade of her sword, a large beam was produced.  
  
The energy was launched straight at the monster and it was engulfed by the luminous energy. The monster, now weakened by the force generated by the mysterious Heavy Blade or possibly Blade Master, was vulnerable to an attack. The girl waved her staff once more and multiple blocks of ice came from the sky and hammered down on the monster. The Heavy Blade character, although class is still just speculation at this point, Hikari, turned her sights onto Sakura and myself after dispensing with the monster. She slowly walked towards us, her large sword hung unto her shoulder. As she stood, eye-to-eye to me, she had taken the flat side of the blade of her sword and bonked me on the head.  
  
"You better give up the game now before you really get hurt."  
  
"What happened to Elexis?" Sakura demanded to know, I mean, Elexis was more her friend than mine, but still.  
  
"Most likely...she's either in a coma or died from the stress of being drained."  
  
"What the hell was that? Data drain? This is more than just a game, isn't it?" I ambushed her with questions but she merely shook them off and gated out.  
  
"Damn her!"  
  
"Yamato! Let's hurry and go find Hanako!" "Right."  
  
"Yamato logging out." Sounded a feminine voice as the program turned off and I quickly pulled off the game gear. I took off, grabbing my coat and headed for the door, slipping on my rollerblades and ran out the door.  
  
I roller bladed on the sidewalk, meeting up with Sakura whilst she rode her bike, ahead of me, I just followed her as she was the one who knew where Hanako's house was. We arrived just in time to see the ambulance ride off with her. Sakura rode until she jumped off her bike, running to see Hanako's mother.  
  
"Mrs. Roze! What happened?"  
  
"I-I..." She just began bawling, slowly slinking down. Her hands covered her eyes as tears ran down her face. "S-she just.... she was p-playing that g- game and then all of a s-sudden she...Ah!" She continued crying after that, without so much as a word.  
  
After Mrs. Roze started crying, Sakura and I helped her back into the house, starting to go back to each of our houses though we stopped, before heading home, by our school.  
  
"Wa-was it a coincidence?" Sakura hesitated in asking me this and she began curling a bit of her hair with her finger, a bit of a habit of hers when she got nervous.  
  
"I don't know..." I couldn't really give her an answer; we were both confused about this, not knowing what we should do next. "Maybe we should take Hikari's advice and just give up on playing the game."  
  
There was silence for a while, but Sakura was the first to break the ice, saying, "No...I think we should learn about this some more and we can start by finding Hikari."  
  
"What is there to learn? What would one call this? This isn't even part of the game! Besides, we don't know where to start and she's much stronger than we are." I stated, speaking slightly louder than my normal voice.  
  
"We have to try..."  
  
"You can try and I can not!" With that, I just roller bladed out of there and back home.  
  
I arrived home; everyone else had left for dinner, a twenty-dollar bill on the counter for me to order pizza. I ran upstairs to my room and just lay on my bed. As much as Sakura wanted to do this, we don't know what we're walking into or what was going on in the first place. I just lay there for a while and remembered the next day we had off and then one more day of school before spring break. I lay there, the door wide open and the phone began ringing. It could only be Sakura and I knew that she would try and talk me into it.  
  
"Every time she calls, I always cave into whatever it is she wants, but this time, I won't pick up the phone and thus, will not be manipulated!" I said to myself, sounding kind of stupid as no one was around.  
  
For another twenty seconds, the phone ran. I gazed at the phone, seeing it vibrate from the ringing. Every few seconds it would do so until I could stand it anymore and picked up the phone.  
  
"Fine! I'll do it!"  
  
"Do what?" I could hear the sound of a nagging voice that I knew could only be my mothers.  
  
"N-nothing." I guess it sounded a bit wrong from her perspective, but I could make something up tomorrow.  
  
After talking with my mom for about ten minutes, I hung up on her and walked over to the computer in my room. Hanging right above my computer were posters of many Anime I've watched in the past, well, ones that I liked. I checked my e-mail and had a new one from someone named '#&%!#$!&' though I don't think I know anyone with that name so I just deleted the piece of mail. Five seconds later, another one came from the same person. I scrapped that one too. Another one, five seconds later. I opened it this time to see what the hell was so urgent. It read, "Delta Voluptuous Geothermal Sunny Demon."  
  
"Crap...those are keywords in that game..."  
  
A few seconds of hovering over the icon for The World, the phone rang again. It was probably just my mom again and I just picked up the phone.  
  
"Okay, okay. I'll do the laundry but I don't feel like handling dad's------- " I was interrupted by the person calling.  
  
"STOP!" Shouted Sakura, stopping me before I could finish my sentence.  
  
"Oh, it's you." I remarked rather harshly.  
  
"I wanted to talk to you about this e-mail I got from a...bunch of symbols."  
  
"I got the same one."  
  
"Then let's go!"  
  
"I told you no..."  
  
"Come on! Do it or I'll tell everyone at school that you hit on someone named Mary at the church whom you though was a virgin."  
  
"Fine, fine...Blackmailing bitch..." I muttered under my breath as there was major static on the phone and my ear nearly fell off.  
  
"I heard that!" She said before hanging up.  
  
Yeah, I know, stupid chapter but I couldn't think of anything to write... 


End file.
